Speaker 1: Broadcasting live from the Abraham Lincoln Radio Studio the George
Speaker 1: Washington Broadcast Center, Jack Armstrong and Joe Getty.
Speaker 2: Armstrong and Getty and he Armstrong and Getty.
Speaker 3: FEMA officials say they have already distributed three hundred and
Speaker 3: forty four million dollars worth of assistance to victims of
Speaker 3: Hurricane Helene in six states. FEMA has also shifted more
Speaker 3: than seventeen million meals and nearly fourteen million liters of
Speaker 3: water to the disaster area. As a result, FEMA is
Speaker 3: plowing through its disaster relief budget and the Small Business
Speaker 3: Administration could run out of money for low interest home
Speaker 3: rebuilding loans by the end of the month.
Speaker 2: Well, we're glad we're talking to somebody who's on the
Speaker 2: ground in those areas, because it's hard to tell from
Speaker 2: national stories how hurricane relief is actually going talking about
Speaker 2: the first big Hurricane Helene and specifically North Carolina, and.
Speaker 1: I think the attention being paid to what the federal
Speaker 1: government is doing is fine and good, and they certainly
Speaker 1: have a role, But as anybody who's lived through this
Speaker 1: sort of thing knows, it's the state and then local
Speaker 1: entities that provide a tremendous amount of the humanitarian relief
Speaker 1: and the assistance when times are dark, which is why
Speaker 1: we're helping to raise money for the good folks at
Speaker 1: the United Way of Ashville and Buncom County, and their
Speaker 1: president CEO, Dan Leroy, joins us.
Speaker 2: Now, Dan, how are you, sir.
Speaker 4: I'm doing all right. Thanks for having me today.
Speaker 2: Busier than heck, I'm sure. Yeah. How are things in
Speaker 2: your area at this point?
Speaker 5: Well, things are still pretty crazy, still pretty dire. You know,
Speaker 5: this hurricane hit us so much harder.
Speaker 4: Than we ever could have imagined.
Speaker 5: And I'm sure your listeners have seen all of the
Speaker 5: images and it is just as bad as folks have
Speaker 5: seen it. It has just wiped out in structure across
Speaker 5: our region and certainly here in Buncom County, from the
Speaker 5: smaller towns like Swananoa, Barnardsville, Black Mountain. We're just so
Speaker 5: hard hit that in many cases, you know, whole neighborhoods
Speaker 5: are gone and having to be rebuilt. And so the
Speaker 5: good news is a lot of our infrastructure is starting
Speaker 5: to come back. A lot of folks have power now,
Speaker 5: Dell service is pretty ubiquitous, which was not the case
Speaker 5: even a week ago, and so that helps a lot
Speaker 5: with communication. But in our county specifically, the biggest problem
Speaker 5: that we have is water. The municipal water system was
Speaker 5: basically wiped out, and we have what I would describe
Speaker 5: as a heroic effort not just by our public Worse Department,
Speaker 5: but by you know, partners from across the Southeast that
Speaker 5: have come into support and rebuilding this because it's so
Speaker 5: critical for our business community, it's critical for our schools,
Speaker 5: and you know, you can't do anything without running water.
Speaker 5: So that's the biggest issue for us right now.
Speaker 2: So before we get into some of the relief stuff,
Speaker 2: Joe and I worked in North Carolina for a couple
Speaker 2: of years, and I I was foot loose and fancy
Speaker 2: free and single and childless. So I did a lot
Speaker 2: of travel on North Carolina, spent a lot of time
Speaker 2: in the Ashville area, really really enjoyed it. But did
Speaker 2: was he even on your mind most of you around
Speaker 2: there that this hurricane was going to be a big deal?
Speaker 2: At what point did you realize holy crap?
Speaker 4: Yeah, you know, I'll tell you.
Speaker 5: One of the things that we have thought about ourselves
Speaker 5: and talked to other folks about.
Speaker 4: Ourselves here in western North Carolina.
Speaker 5: Is just how resilient this area is and and sort
Speaker 5: of the kinds of natural disasters that were used to
Speaker 5: thinking about, whether it's the you know, the big fires
Speaker 5: that they have out west, or you know, the huge
Speaker 5: hurricanes that you see on the coastlines, or even the
Speaker 5: you know, the tornadoes that.
Speaker 4: You see in the Midwest.
Speaker 5: We've been pretty well insulated from all of that for
Speaker 5: a long time. And so this storm was truly unique
Speaker 5: in that we got thirteen inches of rain that you
Speaker 5: know that two days before the hurricane even came this way. Wow,
Speaker 5: in a single day, right, And so it was a
Speaker 5: very unusual weather pattern that basically soaked every we had.
Speaker 5: We had flooding, you know, like you wouldn't see for
Speaker 5: you know, in the last decade before the hurricane hit.
Speaker 4: Oh, and so that was really what made it so unique.
Speaker 5: And so no, we were not I don't think anyone
Speaker 5: could have imagined the level of impact here because it's
Speaker 5: such an unusual weather.
Speaker 2: Event and then a quick one before we move on,
Speaker 2: how long were we all without self service? So all
Speaker 2: this happens, it wasn't even on your mind all of
Speaker 2: a sudden, things are just devastated homes are gone and
Speaker 2: roads are covered, and wondering how long were you without
Speaker 2: self service? You couldn't even talk to anybody.
Speaker 5: Well, it's you know, to sort of answer your first
Speaker 5: question from before, I think it was probably Tuesday that
Speaker 5: the Tuesday before the hurricane hit on Friday morning, essentially
Speaker 5: where folks were starting to kind of look around at
Speaker 5: the radar and say, okay, this could be a big problem.
Speaker 4: And so, you know, and to just give you an idea,
Speaker 4: I was actually.
Speaker 5: At a conference in Salt Lake City, so I was
Speaker 5: not on the ground. So I had information that nobody
Speaker 5: in our community, and certainly none of my colleagues or
Speaker 5: teammates or partners had because they couldn't talk to each
Speaker 5: other really for.
Speaker 4: About two days.
Speaker 5: If you were a part of, you know, some kind
Speaker 5: of emergency response operations, they were able to stand up
Speaker 5: in different places, access to self service and Wi Fi
Speaker 5: and those kinds of things. But for the first couple
Speaker 5: of days, I couldn't even talk to my family who
Speaker 5: was in town to make sure that the folks here
Speaker 5: in our house and everything else was okay. So it
Speaker 5: was pretty much like in the dark for most people
Speaker 5: within the affected region for about forty eight hours.
Speaker 1: Wow, and then you're talking about the catastrophic damage to
Speaker 1: the water treatment system. It could be weeks before there's
Speaker 1: running water correct or even longer.
Speaker 4: Yeah.
Speaker 5: And it's not the treatment system, it's the distribution system, Okay.
Speaker 4: And so they have, like I said, they have been able.
Speaker 5: To get the main line inter reconnected, which is pretty incredible,
Speaker 5: but there's a lot of time that it's going to
Speaker 5: take to actually work through the entire system. They say
Speaker 5: that the linear feat of our water system here is
Speaker 5: the equivalent of the distance between here and Miami and back.
Speaker 5: So you can imagine it's a lot of line that
Speaker 5: needs to be cleared out.
Speaker 4: And so they aren't giving us estimates. But you know,
Speaker 4: it's interesting.
Speaker 5: We do a lot of work in partnership with our schools,
Speaker 5: and you know, we we have schools that are drilling
Speaker 5: wells right now in their ball field because they want
Speaker 5: to make sure not just for this getting water back,
Speaker 5: but in the future because obviously it's everything. So we
Speaker 5: don't have a clear estimate for when it could be back,
Speaker 5: but it's.
Speaker 4: Definitely in the order of weeks and not in newer
Speaker 4: of days.
Speaker 1: So for what it's worth for folks, who haven't been there,
Speaker 1: you know. And I spent a week in Ashville slash
Speaker 1: Waynesville this past July. I have family there, and I
Speaker 1: love the area. It's not only beautiful geographically, but it's
Speaker 1: just so interesting because you have, you know, conservative retirees
Speaker 1: and kind of your traditional we've lived in the mountains
Speaker 1: for generations conservatism. You've got tattooed and pierced waitresses and
Speaker 1: artists and just the most amazing mix of people in
Speaker 1: that area. And it's fun and funky, and it's very
Speaker 1: very American, and it's just the devastation is astounding. So anyway,
Speaker 1: if folks listening get a chance, if you can spare
Speaker 1: a couple of bucks or more, go to Armstrong you
Speaker 1: getty dot com. The banner is you can't miss it.
Speaker 1: Donate what you can to help out to your fellow Americans, and.
Speaker 2: It's going directly to you. What can that money do
Speaker 2: for you? If we can get our listeners to throw
Speaker 2: a couple of bucks your way and you get a
Speaker 2: pile of money, what can you do with that short term?
Speaker 4: Sure thing?
Speaker 5: Yeah, And I just want to echo what you just
Speaker 5: said in terms of the incredible diversity of our communities here,
Speaker 5: and what's been so beautiful to watch is the way
Speaker 5: that you know, those barriers have been broken down and
Speaker 5: we have people just working together, Neighbors helping neighbors, the organizations,
Speaker 5: community organizations helping you know, whoever's out there in their
Speaker 5: community without regard to any of that affiliation. So that's
Speaker 5: been beautiful. Our focus really is right now. We are
Speaker 5: recruiting thousands of volunteers and working with our community organization
Speaker 5: partners to identify where are the volunteers most needed and
Speaker 5: being able to connect those volunteers to those organizations doing
Speaker 5: the work on the ground. We also have created a
Speaker 5: disaster relief fund which will go to these community organizations
Speaker 5: who are directly impacted by the hurricane itself and the
Speaker 5: other thing that we're doing that this would support us
Speaker 5: that we're working really closely with our partners at the
Speaker 5: City of Asheville and Buncott County to help coordinate the
Speaker 5: thousands of tons of supplies that are coming into our
Speaker 5: region through these donations and to make sure that they
Speaker 5: are have a safe place to go to be sorted,
Speaker 5: and then to get out the door to our community
Speaker 5: partners who are most proximate to the neighborhoods and the
Speaker 5: folks that were most impacted by the storm.
Speaker 1: Dan Leroy of the United Way of Ashville, Buncome County,
Speaker 1: you guys are doing what is so sorely needed when
Speaker 1: it's most needed, and you're all heroes. Keep at it.
Speaker 1: We'll see what we can raise for y'all and good luck.
Speaker 1: We're thinking of you.
Speaker 5: Well, thank you for shinning a spotlight on this. It's
Speaker 5: going to be a need for a really long time,
Speaker 5: so all the support that we can get from your
Speaker 5: listeners is very much appreciated.
Speaker 1: Excellent point, you got it. Thanks Dan, great to talk
Speaker 1: to you.
Speaker 2: Yeah, that's going to be a problem for a while obviously,
Speaker 2: and they'll run out of money quick if they don't
Speaker 2: have a big parliament. And if you're the sort of
Speaker 2: person listening to the show, you probably believe in local, small,
Speaker 2: over giant far away, and this is a way to
Speaker 2: get money, like to the source or where they're actually
Speaker 2: you know, the people getting the money or their families
Speaker 2: are dealing with this as opposed to bureaucrats somewhere far
Speaker 2: away who lives are comfortable and they don't really care
Speaker 2: right exactly. This goes directly to the need, and the
Speaker 2: number of news pieces I've seen on how many people's
Speaker 2: insurance doesn't cover this for all kinds of different complicated reasons, like, well,
Speaker 2: you had flood insurance, but flood insurance caused by a
Speaker 2: river rising, not by a hurricane, so sorry, it doesn't count,
Speaker 2: or you just all kinds of different caveats.
Speaker 1: Oh right, and then you got to get into the lawyers.
Speaker 1: Well it rained thirteen inches two days before. Well we
Speaker 1: think it was the hurricane. So it's a nightmare. But
Speaker 1: before you even get there, the roads are gone. It's
Speaker 1: not that they're flooded, gone, the bridges are gone, the
Speaker 1: water distribution system doesn't.
Speaker 2: Work, and what for weeks?
Speaker 1: I mean, it's it's like civilization, modernity was blotted out
Speaker 1: for a huge swath of you know, one of our
Speaker 1: most populated states.
Speaker 2: Yeah, as I saw one guy say, the houses are gone,
Speaker 2: but so's the land the houses used to sit on,
Speaker 2: so that you can't build a house there again. Sohi,
Speaker 2: what does insurance do for.
Speaker 1: Replacing your house that you would have to get somewhere
Speaker 1: else or bring in two hundred truckloads a dirt time?
Speaker 1: I have no idea, no anyway, give what Ken Armstrong
Speaker 1: e getty dot com.
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Speaker 2: So we got a little Tim Walls coming up for you.
Speaker 2: Is on ABC, what's their show, Good Morning America talking
Speaker 2: to the former football player Michael Strahan, who hits him
Speaker 2: with some questions, and Tim Wallas goes back into his
Speaker 2: I don't know why he hasn't come up with an
Speaker 2: answer yet for all of his stories, but.
Speaker 1: It's astonishing that he hasn't. That's what he's doing.
Speaker 2: I just watch it. It's better than it was during
Speaker 2: the debate, but it's still not as good as it
Speaker 2: should be anyway. Also on the topic of the campaign,
Speaker 2: but slightly different, Kamala Harris is doing her media blitz
Speaker 2: this week, which accornered a lot of my favorite pundits
Speaker 2: who talk to people behind the scenes, including Democrats. They're
Speaker 2: worried that she's doing all softball friendly interviews. Still playing
Speaker 2: it safe and making no news's in. She's either tied
Speaker 2: or behind, and you gotta be making some news. You
Speaker 2: gotta be on offense. You got to be moving the
Speaker 2: ball down the field. Just getting out of an interview
Speaker 2: without screwing up is not going.
Speaker 1: To do it. I'd argue, she's not even doing that.
Speaker 1: She's missing the softballs. She's with him anyway.
Speaker 2: Howard Stern, which used to be a scary place for
Speaker 2: anybody to go to get interviewed because he was all
Speaker 2: about making news by being naughty, gave her a heck
Speaker 2: of a softball interview the other day. I mean, just
Speaker 2: as obsequious and fawning as you could possibly get.
Speaker 4: Great.
Speaker 2: Guttfeld was talking about that on his show on Fox
Speaker 2: the other night, and here's how that went. I mean,
Speaker 2: talk about a transition.
Speaker 6: On Tuesday, he conducted an interview with Kamala Harris that
Speaker 6: was so simpering and feminine. I got my period while
Speaker 6: listening to it. You should hear what keeps him up
Speaker 6: at night.
Speaker 7: This is what keeps me up night. I don't understand how,
Speaker 7: my fellow Americans, I don't even understand how this election
Speaker 7: is close. Yes, I'm voting for you, but I would
Speaker 7: also vote for that wall over there.
Speaker 2: Well, he's half right. We do need a wall.
Speaker 6: You had to keep out gang members, Fendyl dealers, human traffickers,
Speaker 6: and Anna and Navarro. Stern has become such a whissified
Speaker 6: sick of a fan. He doesn't realize that telling Kamala that
Speaker 6: he votes for a wall is telling her that he
Speaker 6: knows she's as dumb as.
Speaker 2: One not to mention.
Speaker 6: Trump is the wall candidate, not cackles McNee pads. Oh,
Speaker 6: used to throw boloney slices at stripper's butt with accuracy,
Speaker 6: I might add, cackles McNee pads.
Speaker 1: Oh, that's kind of rough. I like these sipprings so
Speaker 1: much estrogen I got my period. Oh my god. Anyway,
Speaker 1: he goes on, here's Stern.
Speaker 6: On anyone daring to poke a little fun at Kamala.
Speaker 7: Even when I watched them on Saturday Night Live with
Speaker 7: the where they have Maya Rudolph playing you, I hate it.
Speaker 7: I don't want you being made fun of. Oh my god,
Speaker 7: it's too much at stake. I believe the entire future
Speaker 7: of this country right now, I mean as America, Land
Speaker 7: of the Free, Home of the brave. I think it's
Speaker 7: literally on the line.
Speaker 6: So a guy who's supposed to be funny for a
Speaker 6: living now claims her candidacy.
Speaker 2: Is too important to joke about.
Speaker 6: This is the guy who once joked, right after the
Speaker 6: column by massacre that the killers should have raped the
Speaker 6: students before killing them. Not that I like that, Stern,
Speaker 6: But this pendulum swing from saying the most tasteless thing
Speaker 6: in the universe to putting your balls in a tic
Speaker 6: tac container, you gotta wonder.
Speaker 2: What's going on here.
Speaker 6: It's striking that the king of the most misogynistic humor
Speaker 6: ever now turns into a breathless over a progressive, hopelessly
Speaker 6: shallow candidate.
Speaker 2: How about freaking Howard Stern of all people saying it
Speaker 2: really bothers me when they make jokes about you. They
Speaker 2: shouldn't do that. It's too important. You don't want jokes
Speaker 2: about politicians. Wow, the worshipfulness of it. Wow, humor, humor
Speaker 2: is off limits for politicians on my side. From Howard
Speaker 2: Stern who used to think obviously, as you just heard there,
Speaker 2: nothing was out of bounds for humor. Nothing right, right,
Speaker 2: It's an interesting aspect of Trump derangement syndrome that you
Speaker 2: get how would I phrase this? You get cipher.
Speaker 1: That's the kind of fancy word idiot worshipfulness syndrome. If
Speaker 1: something is not or not Trump, I must love it.
Speaker 1: If it is against Trump, I love it, which explains
Speaker 1: keeping the kids out of school and the plastic screen
Speaker 1: at the seven eleven, and anything that defies Trump, I
Speaker 1: love automatically.
Speaker 2: I just I love it.
Speaker 1: She's an idiot, she has no beliefs, but she's not Trump,
Speaker 1: so I love her.
Speaker 7: Well.
Speaker 2: A gut film made a good point. Stern saying I'd
Speaker 2: vote for that wall over there is not exactly a
Speaker 2: ringing endorsement. It's a you could be anybody and I
Speaker 2: would vote for you, right exactly, Yeah, you could.
Speaker 1: You could be I don't know, talentless, have no principles,
Speaker 1: a half wit word salad spout, chippering moron, and I
Speaker 1: would still vote for you.
Speaker 2: Wow. I hope I never become that person. I watched
Speaker 2: Maya Rudolph and I just think they shouldn't be joking
Speaker 2: about this. It's too serious.
Speaker 8: Wowis So there's a couple of low points in my life.
Speaker 8: I'm not I'm passing a line, and I'm gonna have
Speaker 8: a grand slam. The grand slams are the key I
Speaker 8: feel like at my theater checking the AA there or
Speaker 8: an institute of some sort, because this is crap.
Speaker 2: It's full of crap. This is crap. It's full of crap.
Speaker 2: There's an unhappy Philly fan by being knocked out by
Speaker 2: the Mets, who are moving on to the Championship Series
Speaker 2: against either the Dodgers or the Padres. Will find that
Speaker 2: out later today. She says the loss was worse than
Speaker 2: her dog time. Wow, well the dog was old.
Speaker 1: The Phillies were supposed to go on exactly anyway, and
Speaker 1: they Yeah, I'm a Royals fan. So the Yankees beat
Speaker 1: the Royals last night, and they're gonna be She got
Speaker 1: the Yankees and the Mets both in the Championship Series
Speaker 1: kill me in terms of national media coverage. Hmm, yeah,
Speaker 1: that will be profoundly annoying. On the other coast, I
Speaker 1: was explaining to a friend of mine from Elseware about
Speaker 1: why California is so screwed up, and it's politically speaking,
Speaker 1: and it's it's primarily because the Democratic Party has entered
Speaker 1: into this unwholly corrupt marriage with all of the public
Speaker 1: employee unions, and the government serves only to do the
Speaker 1: bidding of the unions and they throw the people a
Speaker 1: bone now and again just to to you know, cover
Speaker 1: up the scam. But the unions nominate the politicians who
Speaker 1: get elected with the votes and contributions of the unions,
Speaker 1: and then the politicians who are former union officials then
Speaker 1: give the unions anything they want until they're turned out,
Speaker 1: and then a new union guy takes the government post.
Speaker 1: And my great fear, because I've always been an optimist
Speaker 1: about the United States and our people and our system
Speaker 1: is that. And you know, our old friend Tom McClintock,
Speaker 1: the Conservative rep from California, always said, you know, we've
Speaker 1: we've run into all sorts of problems in this country,
Speaker 1: and what's great about it will fix them. My problem
Speaker 1: is this that now they have enough bulk of the
Speaker 1: union two way straight thing, the feedback loop, whatever you
Speaker 1: want to call it, the population at large, unless they
Speaker 1: get like crazy fired up, don't really have the numbers
Speaker 1: to turn out well, at least in terms of the
Speaker 1: usual turnout numbers. That just not enough regular people who
Speaker 1: just want a healthy, functioning government turnout. So election after
Speaker 1: election goes to the union owned Democratic Party anyway, that's a.
Speaker 2: That's definitely the government you deserve, I suppose.
Speaker 1: Although they're they're smart people, I mean, they're utterly corrupt,
Speaker 1: and they're they're treasonous to me, they are betraying their
Speaker 1: their most sacred vowels. But they are smart, and so
Speaker 1: they limit the tax paying pool as much as they can.
Speaker 1: So the people who really really care that their money
Speaker 1: is being squandered and given away in this unholy marriage,
Speaker 1: they are way too few in number to win an election.
Speaker 1: So anyway, it's a scam that is so efficient and
Speaker 1: so morally bankrupt, I'm not sure how to beat it. Anyway,
Speaker 1: So I'm pretty discouraged about the state of California, especially
Speaker 1: and the state I happened to grow up in Illinois,
Speaker 1: because Illinois politics, because of the population, is Chicago politics,
Speaker 1: and what's happening in Chicago is crazy, makes California look reasonable.
Speaker 1: So the mayor, Brandon Johnson, who was a union official,
Speaker 1: a Chicago teachers Union official, and the teachers union, because
Speaker 1: that has many, many thousands of employees and a hell
Speaker 1: of a lot of money, got him elected mayor. So
Speaker 1: now his only job is to reward the Chicago Teachers Union,
Speaker 1: and so he's.
Speaker 2: In the middle. The city's in the middle of.
Speaker 1: Quote unquote negotiating what is likely to be a costly
Speaker 1: new contract with the CTU, which is Johnson's largest campaign contributor.
Speaker 1: Since the Chicago School District can't afford the hefty races
Speaker 1: and benefits that CTU demands, the mayor has suggested, get this,
Speaker 1: that the Chicago Public Schools take out a three hundred
Speaker 1: million dollar short term high interest loan to cover the shortfall.
Speaker 2: That sounds like your friend who wants to buy a
Speaker 2: boat and is already paycheck to paycheck.
Speaker 1: Yeah, excuse me, taking a sip of coffee, and he
Speaker 1: hasn't even suggested, well, wait a minute, we don't have
Speaker 1: the money now, so we're going to take out a
Speaker 1: short term high interest loan. How are we going to
Speaker 1: pay that back? Brandon is uninterested as a matter of
Speaker 1: fact and brand.
Speaker 2: They're always uninterested because the government officials know if they
Speaker 2: can just get the money spent, that's somebody else's problem.
Speaker 2: I mean it'll down there before Yeah, they'll be a
Speaker 2: leverage to raise taxes or whatever.
Speaker 1: Just got to get it on the books, right, which
Speaker 1: is why neither party is talking about Medicare right now.
Speaker 1: In social Security or the entitlement programs in short, because
Speaker 1: you just you wait for the disaster, partly because you
Speaker 1: cannot convince the electorate to make sacrifices before it's a disaster,
Speaker 1: because the other guy will say those sacrifices aren't necessary.
Speaker 1: They're trying to take away your bloody blah or they're
Speaker 1: trying to balance the budget on the back of the
Speaker 1: blah blah. And then the disaster happens, the bloody bla,
Speaker 1: and everybody's like, how did this happen? And then you know,
Speaker 1: the politician says, we got no choice. You gotta do
Speaker 1: these hard things. So if that's just the nature of democracy,
Speaker 1: and I ought to just deal with it. But here's
Speaker 1: the funny part. Here's the part I really wanted to
Speaker 1: get to. Let's see, this is from the Wall Street
Speaker 1: Journal editorial board. They say, voters deserve what they get
Speaker 1: in a democracy, but no one deserves Chicago may or
Speaker 1: Brandon Johnson, and certainly not Chicago school children. You know,
Speaker 1: that's the heartbreaking part. No kidding in seeking to reward
Speaker 1: his union benefactor. And then you know when these poor kids,
Speaker 1: who are in large number black and Hispanic whatever, when
Speaker 1: they don't achieve in these utterly corrupt schools. It'll be
Speaker 1: blamed on white supremacy and systemic racism and whatever. And
Speaker 1: Johnson and his ilk Kamala Harris are hardcore against school choice. No,
Speaker 1: you will stay in your corrupt union bound at neighborhood
Speaker 1: school anyway. So his honor is having in seeking to
Speaker 1: reward his union benefactors. His honor is having a political
Speaker 1: meltdown for the ages. On Monday, mister Johnson replaced the
Speaker 1: entire Chicago school Board with his allies after the previous
Speaker 1: board resigned on Moss last Friday. Every air sucking homo
Speaker 1: sapien on the school board said we will not be
Speaker 1: party to this.
Speaker 2: We quit, and that's progressive Chicago. It was too much
Speaker 2: for those folks.
Speaker 1: The previous board opposed the mayor's three hundred million dollars
Speaker 1: high in tresloan. We were talking about that to hand
Speaker 1: raises to the CTU, which funded his election campaign. Asked
Speaker 1: about the opposition to his loan scheme, mister Johnson pulled out,
Speaker 1: wait for it, the slavery card. Yeah, and I quote,
Speaker 1: when our people wanted to be liberated and emancipated in
Speaker 1: this country. The argument was, you can't free black people.
Speaker 1: Because it would be too expensive. They said that it
Speaker 1: would be fiscally irresponsible for this country.
Speaker 2: To liberate black people.
Speaker 1: And now you have detractors making the same argument of
Speaker 1: the Confederacy when it comes to the public education in
Speaker 1: this system.
Speaker 2: Wow. And this is with all the numbers that we've
Speaker 2: talked about over the last year or so of the
Speaker 2: achievement rate in Chicago, where you've got lots of schools
Speaker 2: where it would seem that it wouldn't make any difference
Speaker 2: if they were not open at all, right, because nobody
Speaker 2: reaches his the proficiency level.
Speaker 1: So literally nobody in some of the schools zero kids
Speaker 1: actually zero percent reach reading and writing proficiency. So there's
Speaker 1: just what do you even open for let alones asking
Speaker 1: for more money?
Speaker 2: How about we just close them down? The same result,
Speaker 2: right exactly.
Speaker 1: It's and you know, Jack, occasionally you god bless you,
Speaker 1: will say how do these people sleep at night? The
Speaker 1: answer is they have no shame. They're criminals, They're they're victimizers.
Speaker 2: On some levels like this, you'd have to be just
Speaker 2: to be have to be the criminal mind. It's just
Speaker 2: like I'm stealing from people, because there's no twisting that
Speaker 2: into a I'm doing the right thing for the kids.
Speaker 2: There's just no way, right.
Speaker 1: Oh no, no, that's the pose, and anybody who falls
Speaker 1: for it as a sucker. You're not maybe you're not
Speaker 1: the facts. I'm not gonna try to hurt anybody's feelings.
Speaker 1: But oh yeah, the whole teacher's union thing, depending on
Speaker 1: where you are, it's it's more scammy than others. But
Speaker 1: so the accountants in the audience, I'm sure are are
Speaker 1: asking now, Joseph, you've said that their high interest loans.
Speaker 1: Tell me more about that. Well, the Chicago school district
Speaker 1: is junk rated. When they borrow money, their IOUs are
Speaker 1: rated as junk in the world of bonds, meaning you
Speaker 1: might get your money back. So mister Johnson's plan for
Speaker 1: the three hundred million dollar loan would cost Chicago Public
Speaker 1: Schools not three hundred million.
Speaker 2: Seven hundred million dollars.
Speaker 1: So he is going to pay off the teachers union
Speaker 1: three hundred million dollars at the cost of taxpayers of
Speaker 1: seven hundred million dollars over the short term. I abhor
Speaker 1: the very idea of political violence. On the other hand,
Speaker 1: theft of this size and utter ammorality has been dealt
Speaker 1: with throughout human history.
Speaker 2: In various ways.
Speaker 1: Now he careful and constitutional investigation and prosecution is probably
Speaker 1: the best way to deal with it. On the other hand,
Speaker 1: if one's mind flies to tar and feathers, I can't
Speaker 1: blame you.
Speaker 2: I was trying to find it. A tweet I came
Speaker 2: across the other day from several years back during the pandemic,
Speaker 2: when Brandon Johnson whatever he was at the time, then
Speaker 2: tweeted out that this effort to reopen the schools reeks
Speaker 2: of white supremacy and blah blah blah. Why is the
Speaker 2: president of the Chicago Teachers You. Oh, that's right, that's
Speaker 2: what he was doing at that point, that this effort
Speaker 2: to reopen the schools reeks of white supremacy. That's why
Speaker 2: people want to reopen the schools.
Speaker 1: That's why they want to get the little black kids
Speaker 1: back to learning because of white supremacy. Good, good argument.
Speaker 1: And now he's playing the effing slavery card.
Speaker 2: You have. This guy is a monster, You just have
Speaker 2: to be a criminal. But people vote for him. I
Speaker 2: just said, what do you do?
Speaker 1: It's a proof that democracy Chicago crumble monarchy. Now, well,
Speaker 1: there are progressive cities and states around the country that
Speaker 1: are realizing the air of their ways and trying to
Speaker 1: backtrack a little bit? How far will Chicago fall? And
Speaker 1: and you know, if another generation, a little kids or whatever.
Speaker 2: Color their skin happens to be for goodness sakes.
Speaker 1: Grow up completely uneducated and have no good options. But crime,
Speaker 1: that's not an oh well. I mean this sol it'll
Speaker 1: take Chicago another generation and a half or so to
Speaker 1: figure out.
Speaker 2: How screwed up it is. That's a tragedy. But what
Speaker 2: are you gonna do? I we got a funny clip
Speaker 2: from Trump at one of his rallies. He's going to Aurora,
Speaker 2: Colorado today to point out the whole Venezuelan takeover of
Speaker 2: apartment complexes thingy. And so we'll play a little bit
Speaker 2: from that. Also got to ask Joe about one of
Speaker 2: his favorite hobbies that is now becoming a sport. They're
Speaker 2: declaring his sports. So stay tuned for that, lea, Yeah,
Speaker 2: stay tuned for among other things.
Speaker 9: Right, are you surprised that she's not doing like five
Speaker 9: events a day like barnstorming. I mean, there's only twenty
Speaker 9: six days barnstorming every battleground state three or four events
Speaker 9: a day. Forget the interview thing, Okay, I realize I'm
Speaker 9: biased as a reporter.
Speaker 2: I want interviews the.
Speaker 9: Local news for the local news, interviews, town halls round like,
Speaker 9: it just seems like it doesn't feel like October with.
Speaker 2: The schedules I'm looking at for both of them. But
Speaker 2: I kind of think he has the edge right now. Yeah,
Speaker 2: that's Jake Tapper on CNN saying what a lot of
Speaker 2: Democrats are apparently saying behind the scenes, what is she doing?
Speaker 2: I mean, when is she? Is she gonna at some point?
Speaker 2: You know how presidential candidates usually are in the closing weeks.
Speaker 2: They're like on a plane from five in the morning
Speaker 2: till eleven at night, and we all marvel at their
Speaker 2: schedules and think, how would anybody do that She's doing, Like, yeah,
Speaker 2: I'll go to a Marrabi state and do a luncheon
Speaker 2: this afternoon, but I'm leaving at eleven. I want to
Speaker 2: me back by four.
Speaker 1: Why what this is the mirror image of back when
Speaker 1: you know, after the debate and everybody's saying, Joe's got
Speaker 1: to get out there and show they still has it.
Speaker 1: It's got to do interviews in town halls and a
Speaker 1: parises and stuff. And the answer, obviously was he can't.
Speaker 2: He's not up to it. That's the same reason that
Speaker 2: Kamala is not doing what she's doing.
Speaker 1: She goes to get softballs like what would you do
Speaker 1: differently than the previous administration? And she can't string together
Speaker 1: thirty seconds of BS to adequately answer that question.
Speaker 2: She's awful. She could do rallies though she's good at that.
Speaker 2: Why isn't she doing eight rallies today in four different states.
Speaker 2: Nobody see him drunk. You see drunk.
Speaker 1: So one of the great things I came across in
Speaker 1: I think the New York Times a couple of years ago,
Speaker 1: was the loss of hobbies in America, making the argument
Speaker 1: that for some reason culturally, we had gotten into a
Speaker 1: habit of if you can't turn a profit on this,
Speaker 1: it's not worth doing. Yeah, yeah, And I found that
Speaker 1: very very liberating for lots of different things that I
Speaker 1: could be interested in.
Speaker 2: Just do it because you like it, and it's for fun.
Speaker 2: You don't. It's good for your brain, it's good for
Speaker 2: your heart. Right, you don't have to like get into
Speaker 2: painting or leather work, or or I've got a specific
Speaker 2: thing I'm gonna mention here in a second mine playing
Speaker 2: musical instruments. It was hard for me to do. But
Speaker 2: to get to the point that I'm just doing this
Speaker 2: because I like doing it. I don't need to have
Speaker 2: in my mind how I'm gonna, you know, play in
Speaker 2: front of people or put together a band or whatever.
Speaker 2: I'm just doing it because I like it.
Speaker 1: That's a perfectly good reason to play a musical.
Speaker 2: Instrument or do lots of different things. So you know,
Speaker 2: like if you like the knit scarves, you don't have
Speaker 2: to have an Etsy site and figure out how many
Speaker 2: you could make a week and how much money the
Speaker 2: yarn will cost and what the profit to do it.
Speaker 1: Just do it because you'll even if they just go
Speaker 1: on a drawer, you give them a good will. It's
Speaker 1: perfectly reasonable. People have always had hobbies. In other words,
Speaker 1: and tell your liberal friends if Trump wins, don't hang
Speaker 1: yourself with this as you hand it to them.
Speaker 2: But I came across this because I think this is
Speaker 2: one of your things. You've mentioned a couple of times.
Speaker 2: I've never unders one of.
Speaker 1: My hobbies has become a sport. Self pleasurement is now
Speaker 1: a sport. Sorry, obvious joke, folks, obvious that the comedy
Speaker 1: the laws of physics of Comedy demanded, somebody make that joke.
Speaker 2: Well, if it ever, if ever does become a sport,
Speaker 2: clear room for a bust in the Hall of Fame.
Speaker 2: That's all I'm saying, Katie. Katie's got her eyes closed.
Speaker 1: Well, yeah, because I'm trying to take myself to my
Speaker 1: happy place in a way.
Speaker 2: From what you guys are saying. Anyway, now we'll try
Speaker 2: to move on. We really should, Dick, Sorry, cut that
Speaker 2: out of the podcast so nobody ever hears that, and
Speaker 2: some that doesn't need to be hurt Bright anyway. Yeah.
Speaker 2: The Federalist has an article today about how bird watching
Speaker 2: is now a sport, should be considered a sport. Oh no,
Speaker 2: it shouldn't. You have mentioned you're a birdwatcher. The only
Speaker 2: reason I don't mock bird watching otherwise I would, is
Speaker 2: because I just don't. I'd have no interest in watching birds.
Speaker 2: But my grandma was into it, and I really liked
Speaker 2: my grandma, and she had lots of books about it
Speaker 2: and wrote down the birds she saw and everything like that,
Speaker 2: so she was into it. So I'm not gonna mind.
Speaker 2: I for whatever reason, I just don't have any interest
Speaker 2: in birds. If you told me the rarest bird in
Speaker 2: the world was in the studio next door, I probably
Speaker 2: wouldn't even walk over there and look at it. I
Speaker 2: just don't care.
Speaker 1: Well, if it's in the studio next door, something's gone
Speaker 1: terribly wrong. But you don't trap them to watch. You
Speaker 1: observe thee If I was sitting on my car the
Speaker 1: parking lot, still I would I'd shoot it away so
Speaker 1: it doesn't poop on my car, and I'd get my
Speaker 1: car drive home.
Speaker 2: Birdwatching is a sport. I'm not exactly sure what the
Speaker 2: sport would part would be.
Speaker 1: I know some people who are like crazy into it,
Speaker 1: who want to cite the most birds and brag about
Speaker 1: it and that sort of thing, and you know, to
Speaker 1: each their own. I suppose I just for for Judy
Speaker 1: and me, it's boy, that's a pretty bird.
Speaker 2: I wonder what that is and you figure it out.
Speaker 1: Or we have apps that identify bird songs, so you
Speaker 1: hear something tweeting melodically in the trees and.
Speaker 2: You record it on the app, but it tells you
Speaker 2: what bird it is. Wow, that's cool technology. So it's
Speaker 2: like the Shazam for bird calls exactly. Yeah, wow, binoculars
Speaker 2: in our bird books and stuff. I'm so anti bird.
Speaker 2: When I go to the zoo, it's like the bird section,
Speaker 2: It's like, why is that here? It's filler, It's like
Speaker 2: the bran and raisin bran. You just you just had
Speaker 2: to kill some of the space to claim you have
Speaker 2: a big zoo. Nobody wants to see a bird what
Speaker 2: the brand? And raisin brand is that?
Speaker 1: What? What? Do you just want to eat a bowl
Speaker 1: of raisins. Maybe that's a bad example, but I said
Speaker 1: the other day, I said, a zoo with my daughter
Speaker 1: and my wife. I said, you know, when I was
Speaker 1: a kid, I had no interest in the birds, but
Speaker 1: now there's just beautiful. Maybe maybe a j I'm not
Speaker 1: sure it's a sport. Maybe it's my low tee Billiard's
Speaker 1: not a sport. Bird watching sport golf, you say, it's no.
Speaker 1: It depends who you are and how you play. But
Speaker 1: as the great Jim Rome once said, if you can
Speaker 1: gain weight while you're doing something, it's not a sport.
Speaker 1: That I have no counter argument. Even though that sounds
Speaker 1: like a joke. It's a pretty good way to define
Speaker 1: a sport.
Speaker 2: If you can gain weight doing it, it's not a sport.
Speaker 7: Armstrong and Getty